Oh Happy Day
by chramozoner
Summary: What do you do if you have a crush on your best friend who has a crush on someone else? Nothing, of course. A tale of the average girl dealing with crushes, heartache, friends, what? Gangsters? Beware: Non-talented OC. You've been warned.
1. Teenage Angst? Yum

Disclaimer: I only own my OC's. I'm not making any profit. Thank you.

* * *

Today is just another ordinary day. A day of school, chatting, giggling classmates, and whatnot. Blah. It's so boring to be at school. Especially when all of your classmates are girls.

Ok, first of all, I need to clarify something. I am not boy crazy.

I'm not! I think they're just…Boys, or whatever. That's not the point. I actually don't really mind being in an all-female class. It's just that the whole notion of _having_ an all-female class is dumb. Especially if you were in a coeducational school.

See, there's the stupidity of it all. To go to a coeducational school and have segregated classes. I mean, what the heck?

Maybe the teachers wanted to have full separation between the different sexes but just couldn't afford to split the school up. Or they could just be bored. But either way, the result of this extremely unnecessary decision is that both the female and the male student body have a heightened sense of excitement about each other.

It's kind of like, "the boys/girls are here, but just not in our class". It almost adds to the sense of drama and mysteriousness, I suppose. But anyway. Now we have classes full of people who only care about impressing the opposite sex and dating.

Can you say _lame_?

So now the teacher is blabbing on about something to do with triangles. I don't really understand how math works. Those numbers and strange spatial ideas are completely lost on me.

And after a few more minutes of boredom (thinking to yourself is really a good way to kill time), the bell rings! Yay! Fifteen minutes of break and then it's English class! Another class from hell! I just don't understand how the gram-ma-ti-cal stuff works. It's totally just as confusing as math.

When the class ends all the girls immediately swarm into their little circles and begin walking out of class, chattering and giggling about some guy or clothes or whatever they talk about. I'm left to my own little world until a voice calls out, all high and excited, "Masaki-san! It's your darling!"

Ugh. Why is the world so cruel?

I get up and go to the door. "What do you want, Taichi?"

He fidgets, "Ah, hey Masaki."

I roll my eyes, "Taichi, we've known each other for twelve-and-a-half years already. You've never called my by my last name."

He's still fidgeting, "Umm, right, Chouko. So, uh, my mom was wondering whether you want to come over again today."

I stand there, considering for a moment the amount of people that are eavesdropping on the conversation and the effect it is going to make in the rumour area. I shrug, "Sure. I need help with math anyway."

By now, he looks completely embarrassed, "Oh. I see." He hesitates, "But I'll probably be a little late, I think…"

"Catching up with that anti-school senpai of yours?"

He colours. It's amazing how people actually blush in distress/anger these days. Taichi is probably one of the few that does that at least three times per day. "Please don't say that! You know that Akutsu-senpai is a really nice person."

I put up my hands, "Ok, ok, chill. No need to get offended. And besides, he does skip school and go around beating people up. It's not like my description of him was wrong or anything."

He frowns and screws his face up in a very strange way, saying nothing. The bell rings. He leaves.

* * *

It's after school, and I sling my bag over my shoulder and start towards the door. "Going to see your boyfriend?" a couple of boys from Taichi's class, I presume, jeer, lounging on the doorframe.

"Get a life," I say to them while moving past them out of the doors. It's so sad when they're trying to be cool but they're so obviously not.

Behind me, I hear the girls in my class squeal start chatting animatedly with the guys. Wow. I must seriously not be missing out on much if that's what they'd meant when they bragged about what awesome boyfriends they have.

"You're so cold, Chouko," a girl ran up behind me, grinning and pushing her bangs behind her ear.

I laugh, "Who, me? How can you say that?"

She laughs also, then asks, "Are you going to Dan-kun's house again?"

"Yeah," I continue walking. News sure travel fast…

"How can you do that to me? I thought we were going to do something fun today!"

I roll my eyes, "Like what?"

"Like painting our toenails! And talking about that super hot new transfer student!"

I laugh again. You just have to hand it to Satomi. She can make anything remotely normal like studying at her house sound like a big sleepover party.

"What?" she pouted. "I heard he's seriously really cool! A tennis player and a really good one at that! Plus, he's two years older than us. Talk about dreamy!"

"Mhm," I see a familiar figure up ahead. He walks in shy but purposeful steps towards the tennis courts. I accidentally start looking at his legs. They're really skinny.

Beside me, I hear a grunt of disgust and something akin to "lovesick puppy".

I snap my head back at Satomi indignantly, "Excuse me?"

She shakes her head, "You guys should just get together already. It's so obvious it's sad."

"Whatever," I take one last glance at the tennis courts. Taichi's gone. "I can't imagine us being together. That's way too awkward. And besides," I add hurriedly before Satomi can say anything, "He doesn't like me."

She raises her eyebrows disbelievingly, "How do you know?"

I shrug, "I just do. I _have_ known him ever since we were babies."

We take a right turn and say bye to each other, going our separate ways. On the way towards Taichi's house, I think about the conversation we just had.

I actually never knew that whatever I feel for Taichi was so…Apparent. Oh well, I'm pretty sure my other classmates haven't noticed, so it's alright. And I know that Satomi will never tell her classmates. She's good like that, despite the general impression she gives of being quite a flirt.

I've known Satomi since grade four, I think, and we've always been in the same class together until this year. She's really pretty in that smokey-eyed 'come hither' way, and ever since she started to get her curves and putting on makeup it had been all chaos. The boys around us have been clamouring to get her attention. But for some reason, she never seems to be interested in any of the guys in our grade (actually, I think I can understand why…). Instead, she's more attracted to older guys, saying that they're more "mature" and "sexy".

Personally, I think boys are all pretty much the same. So, whatever. I guess I'm biased anyway, since I like Taichi. Everybody else is just, I dunno, _crass_.

* * *

I finally get to Taichi's house, which is incidentally five minutes from mine, and ring the doorbell. Taichi's mom opens the door with a smile.

"So how was your day?"

"Good," I reply, helping myself to the cookies on the table. Taichi's mom is just too awesome. A plump, middle-aged woman, she's known as the neighbourhood gossip (along with my mom) and one of the nicest women ever. She nods and goes back into the living room, "I'll be here if you need anything!"

"Yeah," I answer and start towards Taichi's bedroom. I hope he comes home soon.

Half an hour and three cookies later, I hear the front door being opened. I gnaw on the fourth cookie, debating whether I should go out to meet him or not.

Nah. He'll come anyway, since this _is_ his room.

And soon enough, the door opens to reveal Taichi, with a rather tall and scary looking guy following him.

"Chouko!" Taichi beams, evidently more at ease without any of our nosy classmates around.

"Hey." I look at the dude behind him. "Hi."

He grunts and turns towards Taichi, promptly ignoring me, "You gonna start or what?"

Taichi starts, "Ah, yes! Wait a second, please. I'll just get my books out." He begins to rummage through his bag.

I realize at this moment that my presence is probably unwelcome here, and excuse myself. Taichi glances at me curiously, but nods, and the other guy, whom I am quite sure is Akutsu-senpai, continues to act as though I am nonexistent. I think he might have tilted his head minutely when I said goodbye to him, but I couldn't be sure.

* * *

I walk back to my house and goes into my room. Sighing, I toss my bag onto the floor and try to disregard that annoying feeling of disappointment. Ugh, it sucks to even say that word.

I remember all those times when I would go over to Taichi's house and we would start playing or studying or eating or just plain chatting. Those were the good times, I guess.

I stare at the picture of him and me in our matching Disney hats. That was probably when we were six. Our parents took us to Disneyland and we accidentally stumbled into the haunted house. Boy was it scary. We ended up being rescued by one of the workers dressed as a beheaded knight when we started wailing.

Now that I thought about it, it was pretty funny. Taichi was scarred for life, though. Nothing can ever get him near an amusement park or anything of the sort anymore.

But I guess now all I have is our memories together. Now, Taichi's got a life. It's not like he hasn't got one before (goodness, no.) It's just that… I guess Taichi's no longer 'my friend Taichi'.

He's 'Taichi the tennis club member', 'Taichi the ardent tennis freak', 'Taichi the weird polite guy', 'Taichi, Akutsu's friend'.

Just not my friend, I suppose.

I turn towards the window abruptly, breaking myself out of my little "emo trance". Whatever. Who cares. He can do what he wants. I'll just do what I want to.

I know that Taichi'll probably never like me...

But, just, gah! I don't know! I stare out the window at the clouds above.

It'll all work out.

Somehow.

* * *

Author's Comment: Ok, so that totally didn't go as I'd originally planned. Ugh. I'll probably have to come back to revise it. Just so everybody knows, all the names in this fic that I've made up are completely random. I don't know what they mean so, uh, don't ask me. (If you're really curious, go search it up or something xD).

Another thing is that I probably won't be working on October! for a while. I tried, but I'm getting a major writer's block. So…Yeah. I might come back to it again later, so it's not dead (I hope)!


	2. Because Tennis Matches are so DRAMATIC

Disclaimer: I own my OC's and a copy of Pride and Prejudice. Please, guys. Have some mercy.

Author's Note: Because I'm totally on a roll, here's ch.2

* * *

The sun is blinding. Heat is rolling in waves through our hapless bodies and I can feel the sweat dripping off my face.

What in the world am I doing here?!

"Chouko! Chouko"

I turn around slowly, "Ugh, what now, Satomi?"

"Look, there he is!" she squeals excitedly, seemingly unaware of the festering heat.

I glance over to see this guy with bright orange hair waving at a bunch of girls. Talk about being conspicuous.

"That's him?" I ask a little incredulously. Come on! She's got to have better taste than _that_!

"No, I mean that super old guy right beside him," Satomi rolls her eyes comically.

"Oh gosh! Eww! Satomi!" I grin at her. "You like Banji?"

She blinks, "Who's Banji?"

"The old guy that you're totally obsessing over. Banji. The tennis coach." I inform her.

"Oh," she still looks quite puzzled.

"Anyway," this is a direct call for a major change of subject, "Why did you drag me along so early in the morning for this? I could've been sleeping. Or enjoying my weekend."

She pulls a face, "The only thing you ever do in your weekends is sleep or stare at that picture of you and Dan-kun. You said you wanted to do something exciting yesterday over the phone. Well, here it is!"

I snort, "How thrilling. I'm ecstatic to a point that I can't say anything anymore."

Satomi ignores my comment, but instead points to somewhere behind me, "There's your love. Now stop grumbling and get your butt over there."

…Does she have to put it like that?

"You just want me out of the way so you can flirt with that orange-haired dude." I grumble under my breath.

"It's Sengoku-senpai for you!" she retorts, already running towards the slowly growing group of girls around 'Sengoku-senpai'.

* * *

Hey Taichi." He turns around, and for some reason he looks really pale in the sunlight. He's got nice skin.

He seems surprised, "Chouko! Uh. You're… Here to… Cheer us on?"

I raise an eyebrow, "What an extreme salutation you've got there."

He blushes, "Oh, right. Umm, hello."

We stand there, the sun beating down on us. After a few more moments of awkward silence, he starts again uncertainly, "Well, I'll just be over there by the tennis courts…"

"Yeah," I nod, and he leaves.

Ugh. Smooth one, Chouko. Smooth.

* * *

I take the long way around to the tennis courts. No use bumping into each other again and embarrassing ourselves.

Apparently, my 'long way around' was a _really_ long way, because when I got there, a noisy group of people have already gathered at the tennis court.

I shove past some people, ignoring their hey's and watch it's. I can't find Satomi or Taichi. When I finally make my way to the front, a strange sight meets my eyes.

Akutsu-senpai is playing. Or rather, violently beating the other player up with tennis balls.

What in the world…?

"This is too brutal," a person beside me mutters.

"How can he do that?"

"I can't watch this!" a female voice declares.

Umm, then why are you still watching it? I decide gallantly to ignore their hypocritical comments.

* * *

The game is over in five minutes amidst a bunch of cheers and boos.

"It's over?" What the heck! I've only been here for what? Five minutes!

"Chouko!" Taichi squeezes through the crowd, apologizing to every person he manages to bump into. "Did you see that?" His eyes are shining.

"Yeah. That was kind of…" I look at his happy, sparkling face.

"Short," I conclude.

Taichi nods, still beaming, "Akutsu-senpai's the best, even though he always gets too violent at the end." He trails off, wrinkling his brows.

"But he's still pretty good, right?" I can't help but say.

"Mhm!" the smile's back. I take a moment to admire his blissful face and ponder just what the heck am I doing.

I thought I said that I'm supposed to get my own life! And here I am, acting all lame and stuff; trying to please Taichi so I can see him _smile_.

Pathetic.

"Chouko?" He blinks at me.

"Huh? What?" I guess I must look as startled as I feel.

"Are you ok?"

Note to self: don't think about yourself being pathetic when your crush is still in front of you. "Yeah. Of course."

Suddenly, I have a feeling that something really large is looming behind me. And my sixth sense tells me that it must be Akutsu-senpai. The sixth sense being Taichi's increasingly happy face.

"Akutsu-senpai! Here's your water!" Akutsu accepts it a little violently, grabbing the bottle and taking a large swig.

"Boring as hell," he mutters, shifting restlessly.

I think I should take some time here to say that Akutsu-senpai really does cut an impressive figure. I'm not sure how tall he is but he sure as heck is at least a head and a half taller than Taichi (and me). With his unusual yellowy looking eyes and bleached hair, it's not hard to say that Akutsu-senpai's the center of attention wherever he goes.

Right now, a crowd is gathered around us (somehow, I was included in the "circle of attention", too). Most of them are people from our school. They stand a little apart from us, looking as though they want to congratulate Akutsu-senpai, but are halted by their natural fear of him.

It's all very strange, especially when occasional glances are thrown at me and people start frowning with confusion. I keep getting the premonition that I'm going to end up being associated with Akutsu-senpai, and it's really an odd sensation, if you know what I mean.

"Yo," Sengoku-senpai calls out good-naturedly, "Good job." He comes a little closer than the rest of the people around us and gives Akutsu-senpai an affable smile.

Akutsu-senpai glares back at him, then heads away from the courts, parting the crowd like the Red Sea.

Taichi follows after Akutsu-senpai, and I follow after Taichi. It's just to get away from the crowd, of course.

I don't get far, though, before a hand grabs my shoulders and yank me back.

* * *

"Ouch! What the heck!" It turns out to be Satomi. Gosh just where does she get all that superhuman strength?

"Look, I have something really important to tell you, ok? So let's go." She continues dragging me mercilessly.

"I'm coming, I'm coming! Just stop pulling me. You're dislocating my shoulders."

She finally lets go. Rubbing my shoulder, I stop along with her in some nice secluded area that I didn't know existed in the tennis courts.

"So what's up? Is the sky falling down soon?"

Satomi turns to face me seriously, which is weird. She's never serious. That's not in her vocabulary.

"Chouko. I'm going to tell you something very significant. Try to stay calm for me."

I raise my eyebrow. _She's_ telling _me_ to stay calm? "Yeah. Sure, man. Chill."

She sighs, "I hate doing this. It's so not my thing."

I figured.

"But you have to know this Chouko. I've just heard from an extremely reliable source..." She stops to stare at me in what I suppose to be a very sad and sympathizing look.

Huh. How disconcerting.

"Uh huh? Keep going." I do the 'come-on-let's-get-on-with-it' hand motion.

"I heard that Dan-kun likes someone."

Uhh...

"Someone that's, umm, not you."

* * *

Author's Comment: Whoa drama! I'd originally meant for this last part to come up later, but somehow, it just kind of happened. So, might as well go with the flow! I guess the drama just starts sooner in this story, then, which is totally awesome for me. (I love fictional drama. It's just so fun to write! Heh. Heh.)

PLEASE READ THIS: THIS IS NOT A BL FANFIC (or Yaoi, if you have to say it the North American way)!! TAICHI IS NOT IN LOVE WITH AKUTSU (at least not in my fanfic). IF YOU WANT TO READ SOME BOY ON BOY STUFF INVOLVING THE CHARACTERS IN HERE, GO SOMEWHERE ELSE!

Thank you.

Anyway, please review and tell me how you think.


	3. Starring The Storage Room

Disclaimer: Same as the ones in the previous chapters.

Author's note: School has started for me. Which is a pain, but I'll try to update as fast as I can anyway (because I love Akutsu, I mean, you guys.) Haha…

* * *

There is a slight pause.

"Chouko? Are you okay?" Satomi's watching me anxiously, and I blink.

"Yeah. Of course."

She frowns, "Chouko, you really don't have to hide your emotions right now. It's just me! Nobody else's looking at us."

I sigh, "I know, Satomi. I'm not trying to hide my emotions. I told you, didn't I? I knew that he doesn't like me. This isn't that surprising."

She stares at me incredulously, "So you mean you're going to try to act all cool and unaffected by this? I thought we were friends, Chouko!"

That last line was kind of a low blow, but I can tell that Satomi's really genuinely hurt and worried about me. I soften, "Look, maybe I just need some time alone. Can we talk about this later?"

She still looks a little hurt, but nods, "Yeah. Sure. Talk to me about it whenever you need to."

Satomi leaves; I'm left with the unbearably loud cicadas chirping away merrily in the midday heat.

* * *

"Masaki Chouko! Get your butt over here right now!!"

I get up to walk sluggishly towards our beloved class president.

"Masaki Chouko, have you realized how many times you've skipped cleaning duty this past week? _Three times_! Three whole times where I had to ask someone else to do it for you! Do you know how much trouble you're causing the other people? Do you?"

I shift backwards. Her face is a little too close for comfort, and I can see the multitude of tiny blood vessels webbing over her eyes.

"Sorry."

"Sorry? _Sorry_? Sorry isn't enough! You'll be taking up cleaning duty for the whole next week, _plus_ the week after!" Having finished her speech, she storms off in a huff, probably to spazz at some other classmate of mine.

I go back to my seat an plop down unceremoniously. Propping my chin in my hands, I sigh.

It's been almost a week after the "Taichi Incident" now, and I feel like… I don't know, whatever people would feel like in a moment like this.

I'll admit; even though I promised myself that I wasn't going to get all pulled down by the news, I guess, in the end, it still sucks.

I growl almost unconsciously.

It sucks!

I get up and walk over to the window, overcome by the sudden urge to scream "Screw you Taichi! Fricken get out of my life!"

But of course, my sense got the better of me, and I turn back towards the spot where my seat is supposed to be.

"Taichi you suck," I whisper fiercely instead, just for the sake of it.

"What was that?" a classmate of mine asks.

"Oh, sorry. I was talking to myself," I wince as the words come out of my mouth. Talking to myself, indeed! Loser alert right here!

She looks at me strangely, then shrugs, turning back to her group of friends, "So what do you think we're going to be doing for this year's festival? I bet it's going to be something super fun!"

"Haven't you heard? We're going to be dressed up as different animals for an 'Animal Café'!"

"Animals? Cute!"

"I know! I call the rabbit!"

"Dibs on the kitty!"

They continue to giggle and gossip about the upcoming school festival while I, after eavesdropping unconsciously on them for a while, finally realize what I'm doing, and stop.

The bell rings and a familiar, if somewhat unappreciated voice rings out, "Everyone, listen."

The class president clears her throat, "If you haven't heard already, the school festival is coming up." Murmurs and intense whispering erupts.

"Ahem!" the class president clears her throat – again, "_So_. Our class's theme has been decided to be the 'Animal Café'. I will start assigning duties to all of you- _What_?" A hand is raised up.

"Will we all be dressed up as animals?" the owner of the hand, which is the girl from before, asks eagerly.

"No," the class president answers shortly, "If you're working in the back or doing cleanup duty you don't need a costume."

A series of 'ehhh?' and 'boo!' follows that statement. The class president raps the desk loudly, and when the noise finally dies down again, starts, "If that is all, then I shall start giving out roles." She sniffs, annoyed.

Opening a piece of paper and smoothing it out painstakingly, the class president begins to slowly announce the assigned roles to her classmates, enjoying the attention that was finally brought to her by their eagerness to hear the news.

"Tiyama Soto, bunny maid,"

"Yes! Yes, yes, yes!"

The girl from before glares at her friend, hissing, "I wanted that one!"

And the list went on for quite a while, with the occasional cheers and groans and shouts of indignation (someone was a hippo). I think I must've zoned out somewhere between the giraffe and the cook (who doesn't have a costume), because when I suddenly hear my name, people are all loudly chatting with each other about what they want to do.

"Masaki Chouko, runner!"

Uhh, what?

People who did hear that announcement are quite confused, also.

"What's a runner…?" Classmate A murmurs.

"A person to do all the odd jobs?" Classmate B suggests.

"The dirty work, maybe?" Classmate C offers.

"Like, garbage take out?" grins Classmate D.

Forgive me. I can't seem to remember my dear classmates' names properly in my exhilaration upon hearing my role.

Garbage take out?

Dude. This does not sound good. At all.

The class president smirks, and I know I saw a gleam in her eyes, "That's the person to do all the odd jobs. If any of you need something done but are too busy, tell Masaki Chouko to do it. It's also fine to tell her to take out the garbage. She will have no objections, right?"

The last part is aimed at me, and I have to nod. I'm not sure why, but it's just a feeling. She would probably do something terrible to me if I don't agree with her. Our class president rules the class with an iron claw, if you catch my drift.

"Alright, now that all the jobs have been assigned, class meeting is over. You are dismissed."

The room bursts into a chaotic mix of squeals, giggles, rantings, bad mouthing, and other forms of general excitement.

I walk quickly out of the door and into the hallway.

Someone must really hate me out there.

* * *

Today's the school festival.

I'm not going to describe to you again all the noise that is going on right now in my classroom along with all the stirring emotions. I've wasted enough of my time doing that before, so I'll go on to more important things.

Or not.

I'm currently carrying three large bags of goodness-knows-what down the many flights of stairs that our school is known for. It appears that the kitchen people are quite busy in their duties and cannot spare even one minute doing their own dirty jobs.

I was kidding about our school being known for our stairways, by the way.

On my way down the final flight of stairs, I'm guessing a fishbone sticking out of one of the bags caught on my shoelaces and somehow tripped me. How it happened completely escapes my notice, since I'm busy falling down the sharp, pointy steps towards (MY DOOM), err, the ground.

I close my eyes, desperately trying to push the three hindering bags in _front_ of my body, instead of behind me. I don't think it's a really good idea, so don't try it when you ever find yourself falling down a flight of stairs with three large bags of garbage.

Wham!

I feel my body impact something very bumpy and scratchy and, in some parts, pointy. I open my eyes slowly, almost afraid of what I'll see.

I've landed on top of one of the bags of garbage. Hey! Wadya know, I guess my last second strategy did work, after all.

And then I see the oh-so-familiar tuff of black hair peeking from underneath the bag.

…That better not be who I think it is.

"Uuugh," the person below me/the garbage bag groans, and I get up quickly, dragging the bag with me.

It turns out to be a very dishevelled Taichi, moaning quietly and sitting up.

Ah. Someone really does hate me.

* * *

"Uhh… I'm really sorry. Like, really, really sorry. Are you ok?"

He rubs his head, wincing, "I think I'll be ok soon-"

Then he looks up at me (with his large, innocent eyes), surprised, "Chouko?"

"Err, ha, ha, ha. That's me?"

He continues to stare at me, confused, "I thought you were meant to be at your class… Café thing?"

"Yeah," I grimace, "but I'm supposed to be the, ah, runner."

He blinks (his long eyelashes rustling gently), "Runner?"

"It's sort of a person for doing the odd jobs." I can feel myself getting more and more embarrassed. Please, don't let him find out what I'm actually doing!

"I kind of need to go now," I say a little apologetically, though for what I'm not sure.

"Oh, yeah," he shuffles his feet, looking at the ground and hiding his eyes with his bangs (darn!).

After a short pause, I offer a "Well, see ya." And flee the scene.

* * *

Ok, I think that a couple of people in my class have something against me. Especially that girl who didn't get to be a bunny-waitress but had to help out with the kitchens instead. She keeps telling me to fetch this, do that, etc. and it's starting to tire me out.

"Masaki-san, please get me a broom."

I hesitate, "Uhh, sorry but, why do you need a broom?"

She glares at me, scrunching her face up in what I must say is a very unbecoming expression, "I just need it, okay? So get me one."

Whoa. No need to get all catty.

"Got it."

* * *

I'm surprised to find that there are in fact no brooms in our classroom.

Nor the class next doors (even though a classmate of mine swore she leant it to them). Nor the rest of the hallway.

So now, to get the broom, I have to go to… Some other place.

That explains my random (but happy) wanderings through the different hallways on the various levels of our school, stopping to ask unfamiliar schoolmates where I can get a broom. I find that this relatively aimless roving is proving to be strangely therapeutic, since I no longer feel as depressed or embarrassed as I was an hour before.

But that moment of bliss, of course, is short lasting, because I finally come upon the place they call The Storage Room.

I don't know why people named this room The Storage Room and frankly, I don't really care. All I'm thinking about right now is that my few minutes of free time is now gone.

Alas, life must go on.

I enter The Storage Room, freeze, and come to an immediate understanding as to why the letters of each word gets to be capitalized.

Because Akutsu-senpai is here.

Which must mean that he comes here a lot (to smoke pot or do whatever that school delinquents do).

He doesn't seem to notice me, though, and his eyes are closed.

Yes! He's sleeping (or I hope he is). Here comes my brilliant plan: grab the broom and get the heck out of here before he wakes up.

Unfortunately, just when I try to close the door quietly behind me, it squeaks and closes very quickly with a loud bang.

"The hell!"

Oh my gosh! He's awake! Quick, Plan B! Plan B!

"What're you talking about?"

Shoot! The handle won't budge! Ahh! Doom! I'm doomed! I'm doo-

"Shut it will ya?" he suddenly sounds much closer. I get out of the way, not daring to look at him. He growls something unintelligible and starts messing with the doorknob.

Wait a second.

Why am I scared of him?

Oh yeah, because he's the _**fricken school delinquent!**_

But he's Taichi's, uhh, friend.

Taichi's not afraid of him… So I don't have to be afraid of him either.

At that moment, Akutsu-senpai swears and kicks the door.

Alright, back to panic mode.

* * *

After a few more seconds/minutes/hours of confusion, I finally come to the conclusion that 1.) Akutsu-senpai sucks at opening doors, 2.) So do I, and 3.) We're stuck here in The Storage Room together until someone very smart and very unafraid of Akutsu-senpai comes here to rescue us.

This really calls for a good bout of hyperventilation right here. But unfortunately, I can't do that; else Akutsu-senpai might hit me, or something.

So we instead sit in silence, Akutsu-senpai being on the 'boredom bordering moody' side while me on the 'oh-em-ef-jee I think I'm going to die' side.

Situations like these really draw out the drama queen in me, in case you haven't noticed.

More silence ensues while I consider how dramatic I can actually get without saying anything.

Abrubtly, Akutsu-senpai speaks up, "You know Dan."

I look at him, startled, "Oh. Ah. Yeah."

He nods, more to himself than anything, "So. He's doing good."

Is that a question? "Uhh, yeah. Probably."

He wrinkles his brows, "Is he or is he not?"

"Yes," I reply quickly. Akutsu-senpai's yellow eyes are shining in the dim light right now, kind of like a hawk's.

It's really scary yet cool at the same time.

* * *

Another period of silence engulfs us.

"Dan likes a girl." Akutsu-senpai states, again in a very sudden manner.

…Is he trying to make conversation with me?

Probably not.

"Yeah. He does." I add, feeling that I need to contribute to the situation somehow.

"Some first year or whatever," he continues.

"Ah."

"You know her name?"

I shake my head, and in case he doesn't see me, say,"No."

He grunts.

After yet another period of silence, I speak up.

"He's a nice guy."

He snorts, "Too nice."

I nod in the gloom, "Yeah."

For some reason, I keep on getting a feeling that Akutsu-senpai knows my depression over Taichi's crush. It's really odd, and a little disconcerting. But somehow, I just think so.

"I really like him," I say all of a sudden, and immediately regret it.

He doesn't say anything.

This time, we sit in a slightly more companionable silence, though my mind is too occupied with thoughts on Taichi to really notice what's the atmosphere at the moment.

After what seems like hours, or more like a few seconds, the school custodian comes in, quaking in fear and stuttering ("I only need a broom!") and, inadvertently, saves us.

* * *

Author's Comment: Why in the world did I write such a long chapter and not split it up? And what the heck is up with that ending? I must be going crazy. Lalala! Crazy!

Just kidding. I just didn't feel like making the second part another chapter because then it would just be painfully short and super annoying (like a chapie of mine in "October!".) And besides, those of you who actually bothered to check out this fic deserves a treat. So here it is! (LOL sorry no cyber-cookies this time. I'm very cyber-broke right now.)

Anyway, please review (my cyber-life runs on them)!


End file.
